John Foster

John Foster teases a potential partnership with Jelly Roll and a few others just weeks after the ‘American Idol’ finale.

Singer-songwriter John Foster may not have won Season 23 of American Idol, but he did make history of a sort when his original single, “Tell That Angel I Love Her,” shot to No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 charts in May.

The Season 23 runner-up first performed “Tell That Angel I Love Her” for his Top 20 solo and revealed at that time that he had written it for his best friend Maggie Dunn, who had died in a car crash.

“The moment that I decided music was my thing was 1000 percent Dec. 31, 2022,” John said during an interview on the Fable House podcast. “Before that I was just teetering around with the idea of music, playing it on the weekends, playing it here or there. It wasn’t until that day when I went through the worst day of my life that I sat down and I wrote that song. Before then, music was just a maybe idea.”

That song was John’s “it” moment. It was the moment that he connected with music in the way that he needed to in order to make it his life’s work.

“My guitar was wet with tears and I was looking at that song and reading it back and thinking, ‘I just did this. God spoke through me and allowed me to put these words on this paper.’ And that was my moment.”

Now, John is working on making new music and American Idol gave him the bump that he needed to push his career along and help him make connections.

“I’m writing,” he says. “I’m in talks with recording. I’m going back to Nashville soon and getting in talks with lots of people where we’re going to make lots of music really soon, and I think people are really going to like it.”

Josh Groban, Jelly Roll, John Foster

One of those people may be Jelly Roll, who John connected with when Jelly served as the artist in residence for Season 23 of American Idol.

“Maybe so,” John replies when asked if he would be working with the “I Am Not Okay” singer. “There’s a couple of different people coming at me from different directions. All great stuff, though. All wonderful stuff. Nothing solid, nothing I can really comment on, but really great stuff. Jelly himself is just a really great dude I’m fortunate enough to have built a relationship with.”